


I Thought I'd Give You A Try

by LayALioness



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-20
Updated: 2015-11-20
Packaged: 2018-05-02 12:01:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5247518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LayALioness/pseuds/LayALioness
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bellamy doesn’t really mean to start writing cheap romance novellas sold for two dollars on Amazon.</p><p>He also doesn't mean to piss off his cover artist before he even meets her, but here they are.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Thought I'd Give You A Try

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt idea from Kay. Title from She and Him.

Bellamy doesn’t really mean to start writing cheap romance novellas sold for two dollars on Amazon. But, as it turns out, classical dissertations and collections of Homeric poetry only sell to a very slim and specific demographic, and he’s got bills to pay.

He almost doesn’t even bother looking at the link his agent—who’s also his asshole cousin, because nepotism means he gets charged in unlimited access to his Dish network and six-packs of Yeungling—emails him, but then he’s catching up on the latest _Bachelorette_ , and getting a little buzzed on the raspberry wine coolers his sister left in his fridge, and, well. He’s a little bit curious.

And he’s definitely desperate for cash, so.

He’s mostly expecting something like the rows of books he sees for sale right beside the checkout counters in grocery stores—about characters with names like Miranda and Rafe and Belinda and Dorian, who are pirates and seamstresses and knights and farmhands.

But instead it’s just—porn. And it’s pretty blatant about it, too. These books aren’t even sold at the checkout lines; they’re sold online, for two dollars each, because they are essentially the paperback version of pay-per-view.

Bellamy’s never really tried to write porn. He’s mostly stuck to nonfiction, or poetry. The most fiction-y he got was that weird fanfiction he wrote in tenth grade, about _Troy_ , where he added in all the Achilles/Patroclus scenes that the actual writers just pretended didn’t exist. But he’s down to his last paycheck, and rent’s due in half a month, so he figures he might as well _try_ it.

It’s relatively easy, once he gets the feel for it. And it’s _really_ easy to do while drunk, which is nice, because drunk-Bellamy is apparently a lot more open minded than sober-Bellamy. There are a lot of scenes involving dragons, in ways he probably never would have considered, before.

They sell by the dozen, obviously, because they’re _porn_ , and they’re just two dollars. He gets one of the dollars, because Amazon’s a bit greedy, and Murphy gets twenty-five cents of that. All in all, he’s pretty sure that seventy-five cents a copy should not get him as much money as it does. He can basically live off his porn, and never have to write another weighty, historically-accurate book again.

He still does, obviously, but not as much as he would like. Fact-checking takes up a lot of _time_ , whereas no one really cares if Medusa didn’t have three enormous breasts in the actual mythology. They just want to read about Athena sucking them.

Bellamy becomes a sort of international sensation, in the weird mythological-porn corner of the world. He doesn’t get recognized out on the street, or anything, but he does get a lot of fanmail in the email he made up for his penname, and surprisingly not all of it is gross. A lot of it’s pretty heartfelt, actually, and he prints out a couple to hang on his fridge, next to the letters he gets from grad students, crying about how his dissertation on Penelope helped them graduate on time—and all the magnet words he buys from the downstairs coffee shop, that Octavia likes to spell out inappropriately.

Octavia, in the end, is the one who sends a sample of his work to Harlequin, because Murphy is _the_ world’s worst agent, and he’s happy with his twenty-five cents and IGA beer.

Bellamy is, alarmingly, excited about the chance to write _actual_ romance books, instead of just two-hundred pages of porn that people keep earmarked on the backs of their toilets. Now his books might be kept in the drawers of bedside tables, or something.

Except, even more alarmingly, he doesn’t actually _know_ how to write romance. He knows how to write sex, which is apparently not enough for Harlequin. They also need at least one kidnapping, one physical altercation (the kidnapping can also include a fight, but it must be separate), _ten_ “passionate love-making” scenes, which he doesn’t even want to _think_ about, and an “intense declaration of love.” So, all-in-all, he’s screwed, basically.

“It shouldn’t be this hard,” he grumbles, deleting an entire paragraph. The book’s due in two weeks, and he has roughly four pages written. He hates all of it equally. “My books are taught in _college_.”

“Poor you,” Octavia coos dutifully from the kitchen, where she’s—he doesn’t actually know what she’s doing. It looks like she’s pouring some orange juice, but Octavia doesn’t drink orange juice without vodka in it, on principle, and ten in the morning’s a little early, even for her.

She flicks another of the two words together on the freezer door, to make _Peacock Sucker._ He frowns.

“This is your fault,” he tells her, for probably the eighth or ninth time; he’s lost track. O just rolls her eyes, because she’s used to it, and because while she found it funny the first few weeks, now she’s starting to lose patience.

“How difficult can it be?” she asks, unimpressed. “Just read some nerdy NC-17 fanfiction, or something, and copy it a little. That’s what Harlequin novels _are_. It’s not real plagiarism, if you add swordfights or something.”

“That’s exactly what George Lucas said, except lightsabers,” Bellamy scowls. “O, you do _not_ want to be George Lucas. I _definitely_ don’t want to be George Lucas.”

“Why not?” she shrugs, coming around to read over his shoulder, which always puts him a little on edge. He _knows_ she’s an adult, really, and probably reads and even watches porn, but—he’d just rather she didn’t read the porn that he writes. It’s a little bit too Lannister twins, for him. “George Lucas is _rich_. And he was hot when he was our age.”

“We’re different ages,” he points out, pointedly exiting out of word processor. O just rolls her eyes and stands up. She lives on campus, which is just a fifteen-minute bike away, but she spends most of her nights in his spare room, because she hates her dorm mate and they’ve been engaged in an intense round of passive-aggressive post-it note warfare for the majority of the semester.

“I’m just saying,” she shrugs, heading down the hall to change for her lecture—even though he’s not even sure _what_ she’s trying to say.

She comes back in a moment later, wearing nothing but a pair of maroon fishnets and a very short dress. Or a very long shirt, it’s hard to tell. She’s marching around in enormous riding boots that stretch up her thigh—he’s not sure how she’ll manage to bike in them. “Maybe take a page from George Lucas—he wasn’t trying to write the intellectual’s space novel,” she says, flipping her hair in the hall mirror until she likes the way it sits. “He was just trying to make a cool space fanfiction, with lightsabers.”

“Maybe I _am_ trying to write the intellectual’s romance novel,” Bellamy says, petulant, and Octavia huffs a little before sliding out the door, clearly done with him and his pretention.

In the end, it’s Murphy’s fault, because he forgets—or just doesn’t feel like it, because he’s a self-proclaimed _ass_ —to let Bellamy know that the cover artist for the book he’s _supposed_ to be almost done with, is stopping by his apartment that afternoon.

Which is why he answers the door in a pair of old flannel pajama pants, his threadbare Laundry Day shirt, and bare feet, toes still painted a chipped mauve from when O was bored last Wednesday, and they marathoned _The O.C._.

“Um,” he says, because frankly he’d been expecting Sterling, the kid who works at Kroger’s, that Bellamy pays to deliver his groceries, and also because he’s a little bit mortified. Not only is the blonde stranger _not_ Sterling, she’s also incredibly hot, and she’s staring at his toenails with the smirk of an all-knowing PTA mom that just tricked someone else into hosting the end of week potluck.

“Bad time?” she asks, even as she steps past him and into the apartment, which would annoy him if his brain wasn’t so busy trying to come up with something to say that isn’t just _um_ over and over.

“Sorry, but—who are you?”

Her smirk falters a little bit, face shuttering off, and he instantly regrets the question. Now she looks, weirdly, irritated, which just doesn’t seem fair. _She’s_ the one that just barged in, uninvited.

“Are you drunk?” she asks, flat, and Bellamy gapes a little. “Because the last writer I worked with snorted Prozac, and I’m _not_ dealing with that again.”

Bellamy huffs, indignant, feeling the irritation spark low in his gut. “Yeah, asking who the _stranger in my living room_ is; _definitely_ a sign of substance abuse,” he sneers, and her jaw twitches, meanly.

“Are you always this charming?” she snaps. “And do you usually go to work meetings in your pajamas, or am I special?” She crosses her arms, shifting back in the usual defensive position, messenger bag dangling against her hip. In his defense, she doesn’t necessarily _look_ professional—a pair of jean capris and a charcoal gray Henley aren’t exactly board meeting-wear.

“Believe me, princess, if I knew you were waiting outside, I wouldn’t have opened the door,” Bellamy snaps, a little gratified when her jaw actually drops open and she just _stares_ for a minute.

“Unbelievable,” she stutters, and then marches out the door. “Have fun finding a new artist, asshole,” she snaps, before the door shuts.

“Same to you!” he calls after her, because he only really thinks of good come backs half an hour after the argument’s done.

And then the girl’s last words actually sink in, and he calls Murphy.

“Hey, cuz,” he says, lazily, which doesn’t necessarily mean anything. Murphy has two general tones of voice; lazy, and annoyed. “Heard you met your new artist.”

“When the fuck did I get an artist?” Bellamy demands, scrubbing a hand down his face. He’s starting to get a caffeine headache, he’s pretty sure. Or maybe just a general migraine from the whole situation.

“Like, I dunno. Two, three days ago? Did I not send you a text? My bad.” There’s some muffled cheering in the background, which means he’s probably at the Russian bar downtown, watching the figure skating competition. “Hey, Bell, this is kind of a bad time. I’ll call you back.”

“No you won’t,” Bellamy says, but he’s already resigned about it. When you pay your agent in beer and Dish network, you don’t exactly expect _quality_.

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” Murphy agrees, cheery. “Later.”

Bellamy spends the next half hour trying to line edit, or force his way through another chapter, or do _something_ productive, and failing, instead mostly looking up weird Harry Potter fanart online. There’s an artist that draws Harry South-Asian, with freckles, and it’s basically the best.

When there’s a _second_ knock on his door, he’s pretty much positive it’s Sterling—one, because his groceries are late by now and two, because he only knows a handful of actual people, so who else could it be?

Except, once again, it’s not Sterling that he’s faced with, but the artist from earlier, looking adorable and furious in his hall.

“Oh,” he says, sounding lame even to himself. “Hi. Again.”

The girl huffs a stray curl out of her eyes, glancing over at the wall so she doesn’t have to look at him. It’s not a very promising start. “So apparently the company won’t let us switch partners,” she makes a face, nose scrunched and annoyed, and he still finds her _irritating_ , but that doesn’t mean she’s not _cute_.

“I guess we’re stuck together,” he says, shrugging a little, and she heaves a sigh too big for her body, and shoulders past him, into the room.

“Looks that way,” she agrees, glancing around the place. It’s, thankfully, pretty clean, since he has a problem with dirty dishes left in the sink, stemming from when he was a kid and convinced that old, moldy food turned into sentient monsters that would swallow him up in bed. Also, he vacuums compulsively, which Octavia still yells at him about, when he wakes her up with the noise.

“So,” he starts, awkward, because—he’s not really sure what they’re supposed to _do_. She’s a cover artist, so he imagines she designs what his book will look like, but he’s not sure why they have to do this in person. He tries, just as a general sort of rule, to not do anything in person. Even his banking’s mostly done online. These days, it’s relatively easy to be a hermit. He really only goes outside when Octavia thinks he needs sunlight, or when he wants to get laid.

“So, I’m Clarke,” she offers, and he instantly feels like a dick, because _he didn’t even ask her name_ , honestly. It’s like, Host 101. “Since you didn’t know you had an artist, I figure you probably didn’t know my name.”

“Yeah, sorry,” he says, rubbing at the back of his neck. It’s a nervous habit he picked up in high school, when he realized it was both, a good way to calm down his anxiety, and a good look for his arms. He’s basically a pro at vain existentialism. “I’m Bellamy, by the way.”

“I know,” she smirks—the smirk is back, which he takes to be a good sign. But it’s also kind of horrible, because it makes her one hundred percent hotter, and he’s pretty sure she still hates his guts.

Also, he still doesn’t _like_ her. He doesn’t. Really.

“Tell me about the book,” she says, perching on one of the bar stools he bought on Etsy, when he could finally afford actual, hardwood stools, instead of the metal ones with the flakey pleather seats that he and Murphy found at a garage sale for three dollars.

Clarke pulls a sketchpad out of her bag, and a pencil he didn’t even notice, from somewhere in her mass of curls. She has the kind of hair that seems like it hasn’t been brushed in two weeks, but somehow looks better for it. It’s definitely the kind of hair he could grip, and twist his fingers in. So he looks pointedly at her shoes. They’re blue canvas, with the laces that don’t really do much, and _tiny_ , and not sensual at all.

“Uh, it’s sort of—a mystery,” he says, purposefully vague. She doesn’t look like she’s buying it. “There’s, um, an archeologist, who goes on a dig in Turkey, and falls in love with a grad student there. And they also, uh, fall for another girl, who’s a member of a secret society, and is believed to be the reincarnation of the goddess Ishtar.”

 _Now_ she looks interested, hand flowing across the page, eyes bright as she leans towards him. “Okay, that sounds really cool. So how much have you written? Is there anything I can read, yet? To get an idea of the general atmosphere.”

Bellamy flushes a little, because honestly up until just then he hadn’t even had _that_ much of a story; it just sort of fell out of his mouth. He’s definitely keeping it, he’s already got a few ideas for some scenes, but—none of it’s actually _written_. “Why do you need to know the atmosphere? Isn’t the cover just going to be Fabio and two super models with long hair?”

Clarke levels him with a very unimpressed look. “You’re one of those writers who hates romance books,” she says, “Aren’t you?”

“I don’t _hate_ them,” he grumbles, even though he absolutely does. He doesn’t necessarily have anything against the genre—after all, it pays his bills—but the Harlequin-issued list of things he can and can’t write about is hanging up on his closet door, and it irks him every time he looks at it. Which is why he hung it there, in the first place; there’s a sort of comfort, in being angry all the time. It’s also why he goes on Reddit.

“Then don’t pretend to,” Clarke says, like it’s obvious. “Have you considered actually writing the story, instead of just hating that you have to write it?”

Bellamy glares over at her, but she seems unconcerned. She’s still doodling on the page a little, and he’s suddenly very sure it’s one of those political cartoons, where his ears are too big for his head or something, and all his words come out as moo’s.

“I thought I was the writer,” he snaps, and she shrugs a little, still smirking infuriatingly.

“I thought so too,” she goads, and he marches over to his laptop without another word.

He’s expecting her to offer to come back in a few hours, or maybe a week or something. Or maybe just give him her email address, so he can email her when he’s done. But instead she just settles down in her seat a little more, and continues drawing, eventually bringing out some old dented tin held closed with a double-wrapped hair band, that’s apparently filled with old smudgy pastels.

“Don’t you have somewhere else to be?” he asks, pointed, after the first fifteen minutes.

“Nope,” she says, popping the _p_ , not looking up from her paper.

It’s distracting at first, and he keeps glancing up to see if she’s looking, or at least turned around in her seat or something. He keeps waiting for her to leave, but she doesn’t, and eventually he gets sucked into the story, and forgets that she’s even there.

She gets up to get some water at one point, and sets a glass down for him, but that’s the only other interaction they have until she clears her throat, and he glances up to find the sun’s setting already, and hours have passed. She’s packing up her supplies, and offers him a tight smile, before heading for the door.

“Same time tomorrow?” she asks, and then leaves before he can answer. It feels more like a warning than a question, really.

She’s left the pastel drawing on his counter, and he stands up to stretch, and go look at it. It’s _him_ , which he’d sort of expected, because what else did she have to draw in the room, really? But it’s _good_ , much better than he was expecting, and in a totally different style. It looks almost surreal, with the lines and colors all bleeding together, almost like someone took a photo of his face, and then spun it in a circle so fast the inertia distorts it.

O walks in to find him still staring at it, and apparently Murphy told her about Clarke—because Murphy likes to tell O embarrassing things about Bellamy, like all the shitty puns he comes up with for titles, or that cat he tried to adopt when he was drunk, only to find out it was his neighbor’s—because she just cackles and shakes her head a little, and then sticks the picture up on the wall with a thumbtack. She decides she’s going to stick around tomorrow, and demand that Clarke make one of her, a better one, with butterflies.

She does stay later the next day, but she still has a morning class, and has to leave disappointed before Clarke shows up. Secretly, Bellamy’s a little relieved; he knows that the minute O sees her, she’s going to give him endless shit about it until the book’s finally done, and maybe even after.

“So, what’ve you got? Anything?” Clarke asks, in place of hello, marching in through the door like she lives there. She’s wearing a pair of checkerboard shorts that show a _lot_ of leg, and a sweater so thin it’s nearly see-through. He’s probably going to die during this partnership—that seems like a very real possibility. There is absolutely no way to professionally ask out his cover artist, and anyway, it’s not like he even _wants_ to go out with her. But he does sort of want to lick the mole on her upper lip, so there’s that.

He’s scrapped the first four pages, which was no real tragedy, and started from scratch. He’s up to three chapters now, having worked through the night, and he’s only a little embarrassed when he turns his laptop around, so Clarke can read it.

“That’s it?” she asks, when she’s done, and he scowls.

“Do you have any idea how long it takes to write a book?” he demands, and she rolls her eyes, because she’s probably used to it. He’s not sure how many writers she’s worked with, but if all of them were the kind of people who snorted Prozac, he can see why she’s so underwhelmed.

“Do you have any idea when this book is due?” she counters, running a hand through her hair, which doesn’t seem like it should be possible. Her hair looks ready to devour her fingers, so they’ll never be seen again. “Never mind, just keep going. I’ll work with what I’ve got.”

“Thanks for the motivational speech,” he mutters, and she gives one of those enormous sighs he’s beginning to think are her signature, before pulling out an _actual_ inkwell and quill.

It’s just like before, except they work for longer, and eventually break for lunch. He makes them both egg sandwiches, because he’s not a _total_ dick, and Clarke whips out a couple of orange cream soda bottles from her bag, out of literally nowhere. He’s not even sure where she got them from; they’re the kind that aren’t sold in stores.

“My neighbor works for Schwann’s,” she says, like it’s obvious, and reads over what he’s written, while he checks out her art. It’s half-finished, one of the first scenes, when Augustus first meets Alexandra, at the dig site. He’s not _proud_ that he’s fallen into the romance-novel-extravagant-name-trap, but at least he chose his for a different reason.

“This looks really good,” she says, and a few crumbs spill from her mouth. “But you’re doing too much world-building. This isn’t a New York Times Bestseller, Bellamy. Where’s the sex?”

He scowls, because—isn’t this supposed to be a _romance_? The sex doesn’t have to happen in the first five chapters. He gets to actually describe scenery, and add a little backstory, this time. As if sensing his arguments, Clarke holds up a hand to stop him.

“I’m not saying _no_ world-building,” she clarifies. “Just don’t go all Stephen King on the readers. They want to be _wooed_ by a Métis archeologist who falls in love with two awesome girls—not transported to a Turkish dig site. They could just read National Geographic, for that. Don’t think of it as,” she makes a noise in her throat of frustration, like she’s trying to think of the right word. “You not offering anything _new_ to the story. The story itself is new. Just focus on telling it.”

He must be staring for an awkward length of time, because she clears her throat a little, shrugging. “Or, just describe the Ottoman Empire for four more chapters. That’s guaranteed to get them wet.”

He chokes a little, because _jesus_ , is this girl even real? “Whatever you say, princess.”

She leaves a sketch of herself on the counter this time, looking pissed off with a dented tiara sitting crooked on her gnarled curls, pointing a finger out at him like Uncle Sam, saying I’M NOT A STINKIN’ PRINCESS! in big, bold letters. He grins and sticks it up beside the first one, and Octavia eyes it a little suspiciously when she gets home.

“You know you’re supposed to be working, right?” she asks him. “Not doing some weird art-flirting with her.”

“I’m not flirting with her,” he grumbles, and nearly winces at how childish he sounds. O just rolls her eyes, and marches towards the bathroom to rub some weird guacamole stuff all over her face. Women’s skin-care regiments will always astound him.

“When are you going to start actually living in your dorm?” he calls after her. She just _laughs_ , which he’s pretty sure means _never_.

Clarke makes fun of his use of the word _penetrate_ the next day.

“It fits there!” he defends, but she still looks disgusted.

“Not a good enough reason,” she says, and when he tries to argue, she throws a book at his face.

Octavia _finally_ manages to get back before Clarke’s left, at the end of the week, and the pair immediately start laughing, because apparently they’re in the same yoga class at the local Y, which is just deeply unfair.

After that, they start sending him pictures whenever they hang out together, in which Clarke is usually wearing yoga pants and offensively neon sports bras, and he just _does not need this_.

“It’s just,” he frowns into his beer, trying to think of how to word his thoughts, which got muddled sometime during the fifth round. “She’s so _everywhere_ , and she’s into mythology, and she’s angry, and _hot_ , and she’s way too fucking good to be working for _Harlequin_ ,” he sniffs, while Murphy mostly ignores him. Men’s tennis is playing on the old satellite TV, and he’s busy checking out the players, trying to watch their balls bounce as they run.

Bellamy’s never really been into men, but he likes to think that even if he was, he wouldn’t be into _balls_ , of all things, but Murphy swears by them.

“Total bullshit,” Murphy says, bored and completely ingenuine, but Bellamy takes it anyway.

They’re at Murphy’s sketchy Russian bar because O went out drinking with Clarke at some place that specializes in tequila and music that’s impossible to understand, and there’s a very high chance that they’ll stumble into his apartment at any moment. Drunk Clarke seems like a very unsafe thing to be around, and he’s a little bitter about it, because at his apartment, he could get drunk in his boxers watching Netflix, while at the bar, he’s surrounded by cheap cigarette smoke and sticky countertops. Also, everyone has tattoos, and while Bellamy has nothing against tattoos, these tattoos are the kind that end up on the prison gang watch lists, he’s pretty sure. Lots of barbed wire stars and tear drops.

But Murphy swears by this, too, which actually doesn’t mean much. Murphy would swear by anything, as long as it didn’t cost much, and could potentially get him laid.

By the time Bellamy stumbles home, somewhere around two in the morning, Clarke’s passed out on his couch in a bundle of curly hair and spare blankets, and he is drunk enough to think petting her head gently could possibly be a good idea.

She doesn’t wake up, but she does whine a little, breathy, nuzzling into his palm. It takes a very interesting effect on him, and—

He still doesn’t have a crush on her, no matter what Octavia says, but. He’s only human.

But he’s also a proven disaster of a human being, and so instead of taking a very long, very hot shower, he decides to curl up in his bed with his laptop, and write the next chapter of his slutty archeologist book.

When he wakes up in the morning, Clarke’s already up, looking rumpled and pouring coffee in the kitchen, and she only looks a little embarrassed when she sees him. “Sorry,” she offers, but he just waves her off, unable to feel appropriately mortified until he has caffeine.

“Since you’re already here,” he shrugs, glancing over at her. She’s wearing a pair of sweatpants borrowed from Octavia, and a tank top that _has_ to be her own, because—just because. Sizes, and other logical reasons. “Want to just get to work?”

She shrugs back, and fetches her supplies, and he gives her the computer to read through, hoping he didn’t make too many typos while drunk. He’ll probably just edit it all out later, but he didn’t feel like going through it before breakfast, so if there’s anything truly embarrassing, he’ll just live with the ridicule.

Except she doesn’t start making fun of him, like usual, and when he glances over, she’s flushing as she looks at the screen, lip pulled in between her teeth, which is—new. Honestly, she’s read at least six different sex scenes of his, by now, and he’d begun to think she was immune.

“Okay,” she says, clearing her throat. “That’s, uh—good. I’m just going to maybe go home, and change, since I still smell like tortilla chips.” Then she practically runs out the door.

Bellamy wanders over to his laptop, feeling a little smug for having that effect on her. Whatever he wrote while drunk is clearly worth keeping and, curious, he scrolls up to read it.

But it isn’t a boundary-pushing scene between Augustus, Alexandra and Sila. It’s a boundary-pushing scene between him and Clarke. A very explicit, specific and _detailed_ scene between him and Clarke, and all the different ways he’s thought about touching her.

Oh god, he wrote himself _going down on her_ —he is actually dying. He’s dead, there’s no coming back. He should just email an apology to his editor, and have O write his eulogy, since Murphy would fuck it up, because he’s never showing his face again, to anyone.

He thinks about texting her, but what would he even say? _Hey sorry about that x-rated wet dream I wrote about us, totally didn’t mean for you to see it_.

Would that make it _worse_ , if she hadn’t seen it? Isn’t that creepier? He doesn’t even look at his phone.

He takes a dozen cold showers before O gets home, and then does his best to carefully ask if she’s seen or heard from Clarke that day.

“If you’re trying to ask her out, do it like a normal person,” she says immediately, which he thinks probably means she at least doesn’t _know_. “I’m not your carrier pigeon, Bell.”

He doesn’t go to sleep, so much as stress out and worry so much he literally passes out from exhaustion, only to wake up to a message from Clarke.

He debates not even opening it, but. It’s better, knowing _how_ much of a creep she thinks he is, right? He’d be a dick to not give her this, at least. He deserves it.

But it just says _bringing the models today!_ There’s no mention of the scene at all, and the text itself is impossible to really read into. There aren’t enough lines for him to read between.

He does his best, anyway. Bellamy is a world-class theorist; when it comes down to it, he’s no better than the people who think the Illuminati are responsible for tin foil, or that owls are actually alien drones sent to record the planet.

He’s vacuuming when they show up, so he doesn’t hear them knock, which means Clarke just waltzes in, as usual. Behind her, three other, impossibly gorgeous people trail in, looking some strange mixture of indifferent, uncertain, and amused.

They look exactly like he’d pictured, but he expected no less from Clarke. She seems to agree, looking smug as she makes the introductions. She’s as impossible to read as that text—she doesn’t seem scarred, or disgusted, at least. She probably won’t sue him, or anything.

“Bellamy, meet Lincoln, Lexa, and Raven—or Augustus, Sila, and Alex.”

He nods a little to each, and sends a desperate text to Murphy, for back up.

Murphy texts back: _fuck off_

 _The book models are here_ , Bellamy sends. _One’s a guy. He’s hot. Like, inhumanly._

_give me 15 mins dont get ur panties in a not_

It’s as good as he’ll get, he knows, so he takes it. And, for once, his cousin isn’t late.

Murphy sets up camp in the living room, in the easy chair so he can pretend to be watching _The Blacklist_ , while he’s actually checking Lincoln out. Meanwhile, Clarke has the models strip down to a bunch of matching, gauzy underwear, and starts positioning them how she wants, while Bellamy makes lemonade from scratch on the stove, because he has to do something with his hands that doesn’t involve the computer.

He can’t even _look_ at the computer, right now. He feels too betrayed.

That’s when he actually realizes he’s too far gone—because there are two, mostly naked and insanely gorgeous girls in his living room, and Bellamy only really has eyes for Clarke, with her messy braid and jeggings, barking orders like some general, at Model Bootcamp.

Octavia shows up halfway through, because her afternoon class was canceled, and she perches right next to Murphy, so they can bond over objectifying the male model in the room.

Clarke’s busy sketching, looking pensive and determined to get each detail right. She’s planning to fill it in with oils, he knows, to make it look like a scene through a window that’s covered in rain. It’s a good idea, and he’s sure it’ll be as stunning as everything else she does.

He orders a pizza—cheeseless for Lexa, but with so many peppers he’s sure she’ll burn the roof of her mouth beyond hope; Hawaiian for Lincoln; plain pepperoni for Raven and everyone else, because they aren’t so complicated—and the sun’s nearly all swallowed up by the time Clarke declares the day over.

Bellamy’s sufficiently impressed; he hasn’t seen the models sit, or complain once while keeping the same position for eight hours. They even _ate_ standing. He’ll never mock _America’s Next Top Model_ , again.

He’s hoping to get Clarke alone, at least long enough to apologize, when the models leave. With their eye-candy gone, Murphy slinks out the door with a half-hearted wave, while Octavia shuffles after, so they can corner Lincoln in the elevator and try to determine who has a better chance at him.

Clarke’s still packing up her supplies, the sides of her hands and pads of her fingers smudged beyond recognition with charcoal and graphite. There are streaks of it across her forehead and wrists, and upper lip.

“So, where’d you find three models?” he asks, because he’s a coward. Clarke gives him a polite, shuttered grin.

“Lincoln’s my neighbor,” she shrugs. “The Schwann’s one. Raven I met in college. Lexa used to model for my figure drawing classes. We dated for a bit.”

It’s all very surface, very to the point—nothing like how they usually talk, their long conversations over tuna salad and eggrolls, about his mother and her dad, about how he hates George Lucas but still wants to see the new _Star Wars_ because he can separate the artist from the art. About how she just does book covers as a stepping stone, but really wants to repair paintings for the MET.

She’s standing in front of his fridge now, fingers grazing one of the grad student letters, referencing his very first, and least-known collection, which is also the one he’s most proud of.

“ _You_ wrote this?” she asks, grinning over at him. She tucks a curl behind her ear, leaving the skin there stained dusty gray. “I’ve read these poems a hundred times, at least.”

Bellamy flushes without really meaning to. It was one thing, for Clarke to read the porn he writes to put food on the table. He doesn’t really put his all into those books, no matter how much he wants to. But knowing she’s read his poetry, read the writing he’s genuinely _proud_ of, the stuff that he feels reflects him like a mirror—and she _liked_ it—it’s different.

“Yeah,” he rubs at the back of his neck again, trying to cool the skin there. “I—”

“I should get going,” Clarke says, sudden, like she’s just remembered. “I have to get the cover done in two days.”

Bellamy frowns a little, because—he’d forgotten, hadn’t he? He forgot the release date of his own book, because, if he’s being honest, he never really wanted it to come. Because once the book was finished, what reason did Clarke have to keep showing up?

“I’ll see you,” she adds, like an after-thought, on her way out the door.

“Yeah,” he says lamely, and watches her leave.

He spends the night line editing, and putting the finishing touches on the book, giving it a proper ending that can be called satisfying in more than one way. He saves the scene about Clarke in a different file, instead of deleting it, and he’s not sure if that’s creepy or not. Probably, but it’s still some of his best writing. He really went all-out.

He emails the finished transcript to the editors around dawn, before passing out.

Bellamy doesn’t hear from Clarke, and tries not to read into it; she’s probably holed herself in a nest of art supplies, furiously painting the cover. She’s a perfectionist when it comes to her work, he knows, so it shouldn’t really surprise him. But he still checks his messages at least twenty times, just in case.

“You’re pathetic,” O says, when he glances down at his phone during dinner. He can’t really help himself, at this point.

“I know,” he sighs, since there’s no real point in arguing, and she flicks a cucumber slice at his head.

“Want me to paint your toes?” she asks, and it’s probably the most sympathy he’ll get from her, so he stretches his feet out, and lets her stuff those weirdly shaped cotton balls in between them, pounding her palm with the electric pink bottle.

She sends him a text the next day, of her and Clarke at the Wegman’s, each holding a copy of _Goddess Exhumed_ up by their grins, and he saves the picture to his phone. At least he hasn’t ruined things for his sister; he knows she has trouble making friends with other girls, and he was hoping Clarke wouldn’t hold his mistake against her.

Bellamy’s pretty much resigned himself to never hearing from Clarke again, which is fine. It’ll suck for a while—she’s awesome, and even if they never dated, he’d still want to hang out with her—but he’ll get over it eventually. It was just a crush, even if it knocked him on his ass a little. He is, for all intents and purposes, an adult. He can handle it.

But then there’s a knock on his door in the middle of a Sunday morning. O’s on a weird brunch date with the model, because apparently he likes _brunch_ , and Sterling isn’t scheduled to deliver anything until four. Bellamy’s not sure what it is with people knocking on his door at inopportune moments, and he’s about to tell the Jehovah’s Witness or whatever to leave, but instead he finds Clarke, looking perfect even though she’s wearing one of those beige trench coat straight out of a film noir.

“Hi,” he says, a little helpless, because she’s beaming up at him like he’s her actual favorite person, even as her mouth turns back into that smirk at the corners.

“Hey,” she says, marching in, kicking off her boots just inside the door, so he can see her tiny bare feet. They’re wearing matching nail polish, which would be a little embarrassing, if he wasn’t so happy she was actually _there_.

“Are you going to shut the door?” she asks, full-on smirking now, and he just shakes his head, turning to close it.

“Of course, yeah, sorry—what are you…” he trails off when he turns back around, because Clarke’s shed her coat now, which means she’s wearing _nothing_.

Clarke is standing naked in his living room, smiling hopefully over at him, and the most he can do is choke.

“And here I thought you were good with words,” she teases, but she sounds a little nervous underneath, and Bellamy almost trips over himself, to get to her.

“I thought you weren’t going to ever talk to me again,” he admits, folding his hand in her hair. It’s exactly as he imagined.

“Actually, I was hoping to get a demonstration,” she chirps, and he’s still grinning when he kisses her.

They make it to the couch eventually, but only after he has her squirming and fucking _eager_ , and she’s still sprawled over him, panting, when he finally laughs.

Clarke props herself up on one elbow, tracing symbols on his chest. “What?” There are red marks down her neck and chest, left from his mouth, and he grins as he reaches out to touch them.

“I can’t believe you wore a _trench coat_ ,” he teases, and she ducks to hide her face in his side. “And nothing underneath!”

“We work for _Harlequin_ ,” she defends, grazing her teeth against his nipple until he jumps. He tugs her hair, chastising, but she seems to like it, so he’s not sure it works. “I thought it was appropriate!”

“It was awesome,” he grins, and leans up to kiss her. He does still have a lot of things he wants to try, a lot of places he wants to put his mouth on her, but _god_ , he could kiss her all day. And she moans into his mouth each time, all appreciative and happy, so he’s pretty sure she feels the same way. “You’re awesome,” he says, pulling back, and she smiles, swinging a leg over to grind against his thigh.

“From what I remember, there was a _lot_ more to that scene,” she says, prim tone at total odds with her voice, gone deep and breathy. Bellamy laughs, rolling over so she’s under him, looking up.

“We have time,” he says, but it comes out like a question, and she smiles, sliding a hand on his cheek.

“We do have time,” she agrees, pressing her grin to his mouth.

Harlequin likes his book, of course, and Murphy calls with a new deal two weeks later.

“They have a new cover artist,” he says, only sounding a little bit like a dick. “If you want. They weren’t sure you really fit with the last one.”

Bellamy lets a stupid grin take over his face, as he watches Clarke do her best Gordon Ramsay impression in the kitchen, with the appliances as the stupid contestants that are all ruining her food. They'll probably have to order something from the Thai place down the road; the last time he let her cook, he had to take the batteries out of all of his smoke detectors. She’s got his old MSU sweatshirt hanging off of one shoulder, just a little down her thighs, and her hair’s it’s usual mess, tangled up in a scrunchie.

“Tell them no thanks,” he says. “The last one and I fit just fine.”


End file.
